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Saturday, November 22, 2014

This is a prayer I recite every morning after my meditation for the furthering of advancing equality and access for autistic people in our society. This prayer is for the advancement of cross-disability activism, inclusive education, inclusive societies, neurodiversity, the halting of the excesses of groups like Autism Speaks, and for the safety of all current and future autistic people in the hands of their caregivers and others.

May we never allow the short sight of people’s potential
to override the long future we are all bound to share together.

May we never allow our thoughts on the quality of one’s
future stop their future from coming to fruition.

May we not let groups paying large money to medical,
management, or corporate expenses move us to not pay it forward.

May we not allow the medicine we have been given me used
to call others diseased.

May we utilize our hearts with wisdom and striving,

recognizing all people under oppression and ableism as
potential allies.

May we take note of the discrepancies on our schools and
let the government know that we know.

May we allow all brains the full opportunity to make
their greatest contribution to society, notwithstanding our current medical
knowledge in any given age,

peacefully when we can, while protecting ourselves and
our loved ones from harm and danger.

I say this prayer to plant its wisdom firmly within me so
that it may spread around me and throughout our earth,

Sunday, November 9, 2014

This is a response to sorority Alpha Xi Delta over their support of Autism
Speaks.Currently, during the murders of
London McCabe by his mother, his father asks that all donations in respect to
him go to the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network or the Dan Marino Foundation.I put this up in response wondering if AZD
truly cares about “the children” as they say they do.

Higher Priorities

How many Alpha Xi Delta chapter heads does it take to
screw in a light bulb?

None.

Because in their world, lightbulbs were never invented

because no one existed to invent them.

And yes, bring on the “fuck you’s,” and rolling your eyes

because in four years, your letters will go in a box,

but our lives will live on forever.

And you may become mothers of children, even autistic
children,

and then where will that have gotten you?
We are the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network,

Friday, November 7, 2014

It’s no news to me that autistic children have been
murdered by their parents, as have non-autistic children, and when they are,
they are frequently given lighter sentencing (because their child was
autistic), and shown great sympathy by the media, who praise their actions as “mercy
killings.”Karen McCarron, an Illinois
mother of a non-verbal autistic daughter, killed her daughter in 2006 and was
sentenced in 2008 with thirty-six years in prison, thirty months of supervised release after
her prison term and a $25,000 fine.The
media praised Karen, however, saying she was brave to kill her daughter because
she “might not have had a good life.”This
argument is used by mothers who get abortions, yet the politicians (particularly
Conservative Republicans) and the media, especially in the last few days with
the elections being held, demonize these women as murderers and
child-killers.But when a child that is
unequivocally a living thing is murdered, assuming they are autistic, the media
and law makers give them sub-standard sentences and sympathy.Recently, two autistic boys, not even ten
years old, were murdered by the people they should have been able to trust the
most: London McCabe, seven-years old, by his mother Jillian, and Jude Mirra,
eight, by his medical entrepreneur California mother Gigi Jordan.For this, Jordan was given twenty-five years
for manslaughter, while Jillian is held on $1 million bail until her court date
on November 12.Jillian has also been
justified by her supporter under the notion that he was mentally ill.

It
saddens me to see these boys lost.They
were younger than any people I have ever known or met to have died young,
including twenty-year old college students who I danced with at a school
formal.While the media

1.While the media praises “courage” of these
non-verbal autistic mothers, they show no respect for mothers of non-verbal
autistics who gave their children all they could to have the best possible life:Seriously, there are non-verbal autistic
whose mothers (and fathers) respected that they had great talents and gifts to
give, in spite of the fact that they would never meet conventional markers of
success, including Brooke, the daughter of autism mother and blogger Diary of a Mom, Emma Hope, and Amy Sequenzia.I know many of these mothers myself and they
are willing to sacrifice everything they have worked for so their child can live with the best possible life.Ignoring these mothers while praising Jillian
and Jordan is an insult, as if saying it is more courageous to murder your
autistic child than showing them love and support to lead whatever the best
possible life is for them.

2.McCabe and Jordan did not make the most human choices for their son, and there were
plenty of others out there: Even if they could not have handled the stress
of raising a non-verbal autistic child, there are others who could who would
have been happy to raise these boys.Autism organizations worldwide spoke out on the murder of London,
stating how before his death, many other parents were willing to adopt
him.The media honors these two mothers
for instantly jumping to the most violent and life-threatening solution.

3.The phrase “mental illness” does not
justify murder: When mentally ill people such as Elliot Rodgers and Adam
Lanza from the Santa Barbara and Sandy Hook shooting murder non-autistic and
older people, we do not tolerate that.Jillian McCabe and Gigi Jordan should be no different.

4.And for one fourth fact: How will Jillian
and Jordan’s life after their children’s death compare to the life their
children will now never know:Jordan’s
(and possibly Jillian’s) sentencing, though not near what I would have liked it
to be, will include over two decades of prison, with possible jail rape, abuse,
and physical and emotional torture.Not
to mention the fact that they are both now parents who have lost their own
children.I know many of these
parents.I have stayed up crying
countless nights for their own well-being, as well as my own.They and their children have gone to my
schools, my temples, my workplaces, everywhere.Many never recover and have later contemplated or tried suicide. That Jordan and Jillian thought the pain of
losing their child would be less than the pain of their children as they never
make it to traditional markers of success shows me how little they care about
them.And the fact that they were
willing to face the cruelties of prison life over living in a world with their
sons shows me they deserve them even more.These events have prompted such a passion for all autistic people in me that the day after I
heard about the first one, I wrote on Facebook with a link shared to the murder, “Let me just say to everyone now that if you ever abuse, neglect,
discriminate, intimidate, harass, or malign an autistic of any background, in
any capacity, for any reason or for any cause, I wish for no connection of any
type to you, whether they be professional, romantic, platonic, or even
electronic. Let me also say to anyone who has endorsed, promoted, or
manipulated the idea of "autism awareness" in any way: that the mere
phrase "autism awareness" is not a term for which I will instantly
consider you harmful, but if you are to be connected to that phrase in any way
possible, I consider the burden of proof to be on you that you and your efforts
have gone beyond the bare minimum to respect the concerns, issues, respect,
dignity, equality, feelings, and integrity of every single, solitary person who
is in any way, shape, or form a member of the autistic community.”

Saturday, November 1, 2014

For me, I felt like I didn’t get to do enough celebrating
yesterday at Halloween. I could have gone trick-or-treating, could have carved
a pumpkin, or toured my schools old Yeater hall and learn the legends of how
the third floor of what used to be the sorority house is haunted.But instead I got caught up in homework,
environmental work, and trying to start and autistics student and peer organization
at UCM.Don’t get me wrong.I enjoy these things, but because of them I
didn’t get to celebrate much Halloween.Luckily, November 1 of every year is Autistics Speaking Day.Autistics Speaking Day is a holiday started
by autistic activist Corina Becker and promoted by her friend Kathryn
Bjornstead in response to an event called Communication Shutdown, where people
are asked to go a day without social media, which to its creators is supposed
to show non-autistic people the sense of isolation they think we experience in
our daily lives.While Communication
Shutdown may have been started with the best intentions, it shows a real lack
of understanding of how many real autistics feel.In response to this projection by
non-autistic people, Autistics Speaking Day was created on November 1 through a
website started by Corina called autisticsspeakingday.blogspot.com. Each year it collects writings from autistic
people all around the world to tell their stories in their own words and grew
to over several thousands of contributors since it has started.Note: it is not connected to Autism Speaks or
any other major organization that is devoid of autistic representation or uses
analogies of autistics to car wrecks to raise money for genetic research into
autism without helping families bear the financial costs of paying for autism services
out of their pockets.Some contributors
do support AS, but they do not represent all autistics contributing.I wish I’d mentioned this sooner, but if you
are autistic, or an ally (which they'll ask you in the form), you can find the
submission form next year on their website at autisticsspeakingday.blogspot.com.Be sure to submit before November 1 of next
year.

This year I wrote a post for The Autist Dharma Ten Examples that Show
Violence Against Autistics is Alive and Well in American Culture, for which I
also submitted a link, my name, and the title to the Autistics Speaking Day
website submission form for 2014.Note:
this post contains graphic depictions of horrible acts committed by society to
autistic people, for which I mentioned on the submission form, as I was asked
if my post needed any content/trigger warnings.If you are triggered by acts of violence, including rape, torture, and
electroshock therapy, do not keep reading any further.f you are interested in reading it, and you know
you can handle it, you can find it on Autistics Speaking Day’s website at http://autisticsspeakingday.blogspot.com/2014/10/ten-examples-that-show-violence-against.html
with the rest of this year’s Autistic Speaking Day Posts.Or you can find it on my blog at http://autistdharma.blogspot.ca/2014/10/ten-examples-that-show-violence-against.html
with the rest of my posts (and there’s a link on ASDay’s website with a link to
my blog anyway, so…).So if you want,
sit back and enjoy the Halloween season.